Static and Dynamic Disparities between Monetary and Multidimensional Poverty Measurement: Evidence from Vietnam

There has been a rapid expansion in the literature on the measurement of multidimensional poverty in recent years. This paper focuses on the longitudinal aspects of multidimensional poverty and its link to dynamic income poverty measurement. Using panel household survey data in Vietnam from 2007, 2008, and 2010, the paper analyses the prevalence and dynamics of both multidimensional and monetary poverty from the same dataset. The results show that the monetary poor (or non-poor) are not always multidimensionally poor (or non-poor) - indeed the overlap between the two measures is much less than 50%. Additionally, monetary poverty shows faster progress as well as a higher level of fluctuation than multidimensional poverty. We suggest that rapid economic growth as experienced by Vietnam has a larger and more immediate impact on monetary than on multidimensional poverty. 

Citation: Tran, V. Q., Alkire, S., and Klasen S. (2015). 'Static and dynamic disparities between monetary and multidimensional poverty measurement: Evidence from Vietnam', OPHI Working Paper 97, Oxford Poverty and Human Development Initiative (OPHI), University of Oxford.

Also published in Research on Economic Inequality, 2015, Vol. 23, pp. 249–281.